


How Do You Sleep

by donotspeaktomeofdragonfire



Category: The Yogscast
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, Little bit of angst, M/M, POV Rythian, POV Second Person, Sharing a Bed, Spooning, Tea, Yogscast Complete World, it's so sweet i've got cavities
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-24
Updated: 2015-01-24
Packaged: 2018-03-08 22:17:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3225464
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/donotspeaktomeofdragonfire/pseuds/donotspeaktomeofdragonfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because Maj convinced me that fuffy Rythna is a thing.<br/>(froggylee on tumblr)<br/>--</p><p>Rythian is cold and wet and just needs a place to hide out for the night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How Do You Sleep

You’ve rebuilt after more worlds than you can remember. You’ve repatched yourself, stitched yourself up after wounds both physical and emotional. You’re strong, you know what you’re doing. You can take care of yourself.

But when you wake up once again, aching on damp grass, feeling like you’ve been thoroughly scrubbed clean in the way death always does, you know you need someone else. Zoey’s not around to help you any more, and the night is danger when you’re practically naked. You force yourself up, and try to get a sense of your surroundings. You’re in the middle of a dark forest, and you pick a direction and walk. You’ll find shelter somewhere.

On the horizon are two smoke signals, marking civilization. Stumbling towards it, you can see that the building they originate from is made of red-and-white angles, surrounded by nature and flanked by forests. You make your way up the front steps, shivering, and knock. You take care to adjust your scarf and smooth down your hair, in hopes that you would look more respectable. There’s a few shouts from inside the house, and a moment later, the door opens. Standing in the doorway is one of the last people you’d like to see right now.

His blond hair is even shaggier than the last time you saw him- apparently no one has opened a barbershop yet- and his weary face scrunches as he attempts to figure out why the hell you’re standing at his door, of all people. You’re trying to figure that out yourself.

“Rythian?” The sleepiness in his voice cracks on the syllables.

“It’s cold,” you remark, as if you’re only here to talk about the weather. It’s true enough, your clothes and hair are dripping from the rain.

“Who is it?” a high-pitched voice calls from a higher floor. “Is it an emergency?”

“I don’t know yet, Kim,” he replies.”Just go back to sleep.”

“Don’t die,” she tells him, and he reassures her that he won’t and turns back to you. His nose is too big, you think, and there are dark circles around his eyes. Apparently he still doesn’t sleep much. But the most noticeable thing about him is the purple slowly creeping up his face and hands, claiming his skin for its own. It reminds you of your own scars, and yet he feels confident enough to display it.

“I just need a place to stay for the night.” He could kill you, again, and you wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.

He looks at you for a moment, and you can almost hear the intricate mechanisms of his mind whirling. Around the both of you, it’s like a chess game, where every move must be planned five moves before. And you’ve just thrown a spanner in the cogs.

You’re not good at metaphors when you’re tired.

“I suppose so.” He steps aside, reluctantly, and you slip your boots off before walking into the tiny entrance room. Lalna always loved big, fancy castles, filled with noisy, intrusive machinery, but here it is fairly quiet. He looks at you oddly, which isn’t surprising considering you haven’t seen each other for some years, and this is how you reintroduce yourself.

“I don’t know where you’re planning on sleeping,” he admits. “We haven’t any spare beds.”

“Even just the floor will be fine, I just needed someplace to get out of the rain until morning.” You resign yourself to your fate, but he still looks uncomfortable with that. Instead of arguing, he bustles over to the kitchen, pulling open the fridge with a pop.

“Can I get you anything? Tea, fish, um… herbal root? Is that Kim’s?” He muses to himself. You slide up behind him and examine the ingredient he holds.

“Not anything magical, just ginger. Haven’t you ever seen ginger?”

He puts on an indignant face to cover his embarrassment. “I don’t do the cooking much.”

“Tea will be fine, if you insist.” Looking around for a place to sit and rest, you notice there is none, and settle for sitting on the stairs. There’s a hole with a ladder in the floor, likely leading to a vast underground network of unnatural wiring and deadly weapons. Above the ladder, proudly mounted on the wall, are the decapitated heads of several monsters and one generic human you seem to recognize, but can’t place. Funny, you thought you knew everyone here.

You can hear him setting things up in the kitchen and take a moment to breathe. It’s wonderfully warm inside, and though you’re still soaked, your fingers and toes are beginning to return to normal. Your head nods, and you find yourself struggling to stay upright as your lack of sleep crashes over you.

The teakettle sings, and Lalna brings over two mugs. The one he hands to you has a chip in the top, and around it in large purple letters it reads “GET FLUXED.” It’s rather odd, yet charming. You dip your nose into the cup and inhale the sweet scent, shivering a bit. Unexpectedly, he sits down on the step next to you, his large hands wrapping around his own mug so you can’t get a good look at it. Why you care about what his tea comes in, you don’t know.

You look down at your tea again and remember something you’ve forgotten.

You can’t drink tea with your scarf on.

You look up at Lalna, who is trying not to seem like he is looking at you expectantly.

You look down at your tea again, set it down at your feet, and sigh, reaching up and hooking a finger over the delicate fabric. It settles around your neck and your hands tighten into fists on your legs as you tell yourself not to scratch at the scars that split your face like broken glass. You pick up your tea and sip it, shivering as the warmth spreads throughout your insides. Daring a cautious glance at Lalna, you can tell he’s staring at you. Who wouldn’t be? Luckily for you, and him, he doesn’t dare try to touch them, but instead sips his own tea in silence.

“So who is the girl?” you ask quietly, eager to get the attention off of yourself.

“Oh, that’s Kim. We’ve been working together for a while. Don’t you remember her? From...before?”

Of course you remember. You’d really rather not, especially in such an intimate environment. He seems puzzled you had to ask, forgetting that you weren’t exactly all that close, considering.

Lalna may not know how to cook, but he makes a good cup of tea. Everyone should learn to make a good cup of tea.

“How’s, uh, your one?” he asks you, and you look up in surprise. Did he honestly care that much to ask, or was it just polite small talk?

“Zoey’s gone to space, with her girlfriend, I think. We don’t talk much anymore.” He nods, as if he understands. He doesn’t.

You’ve almost finished your drink and you’re almost entirely warm when he speaks again.

“You can’t just sleep on the floor.”

“Where else do you expect me to sleep? I don’t see a couch anywhere here.”

“You could-” He cuts himself off in the middle of a thought and shakes his head, his long hair floating against his pink cheeks. “I’m sure we’ll think of something.”

“How many beds do you have?”

“Just the two.”

It’s definitely going to be some difficult arrangements if he insists on you being comfortable.

You finish your tea. You wish you hadn’t. He stands and takes the mug gingerly from your hands, bringing them to the sink. You notice, almost for the first time, that he’s still wearing his lab coat. It seemed so natural that you didn’t even question it, but he was asleep, wasn’t he? Perhaps he just pulled it on as he came downstairs.

“Come on.” He starts up the stairs, and you stare after him in confusion. Didn’t you just figure out that this wasn’t going to work?

Hesitantly, you rise to your feet. You’re a bit unsteady, like exhaustion just hit a switch to turn you off. It’s worse than waves now. You reach out a hand, searching for a wall, but instead find Lalna’s arm. He doesn’t seem fazed when you look up at him, rather, he extends his arm further and encourages you to put your weight on him.

He’s soft, and you’ve imagined beating that face into oblivion but you’ve never imagined it to shine with warmth that rivals the tea, and especially never directed at you. There’s a distant memory of being young and laughing together, of discovery and peace, before any of the wars came about. You’d never thought you’d find yourself at the end of one of his smiles again.

He helps you slowly up the stairs, and you find yourself in a tiny room with lots of furniture. This looks more like a home than the ground floor. There’s a couch here, and you make for that but he still has his hand on your arm, and wasn’t it the other way around before?

“You’ll freeze to death. Your clothes are still wet,” he whispers, careful not to wake the person in the next bed. What does he expect you to do with this revelation?

He moves towards you, too quickly, and you flinch and duck out of his way on instinct. You can see his face fall, even in the little light provided by the moon, and he looks like he’s trying to be sympathetic. You don’t want his pity.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and he’s saying it like he means it to extend to everything he’s done, every world and life and home he’s destroyed, every wrong turn in his life, and he’s saying it like you’re the only one who can forgive him.

But you can’t. The only thing you can do is step forward, to force yourself to extend your arms and place them around him in some semblance of a hug, and he’s so large and you’re so thin that he can reach around you and touch his elbows on either side. He relaxes into it, apparently more used to physical affection than you are,not caring that you’ll get his coat all wet.

“Sleep with me?” he mumbles, and you try to pull back, but he holds you in place, glaring at him.

“No, no, I didn’t mean it like that,” he corrects himself. “God I’m tired. I just meant I don’t want you to have to sleep on your own.”

After a moment of quiet deliberation, you decide that you, too, are too tired to care either way, and nod. He releases you and unbuttons his lab coat, leaving him in long boxers and a light purple t-shirt. Purple was always your colour. Does he have to take everything of yours?

You decide that you can remove your clothing as well. It would be best to leave them out to dry. Your socks come first, then your scarf, sliding off your neck in one smooth, practiced motion. Your coat and finally shirt are draped across the back of the sofa, and you stand in just your trousers. They cling to your legs and you know you can’t get in bed with them on, so you slowly peel them down your legs. He politely looks away, and you’re grateful. You feel naked, more than just physically, being here.

“Right then.” He walks over to the unoccupied bed. It looks small, too small, and it’s messy. He pulls back the covers and slides in, wholeheartedly expecting you to follow. What else can you do? You’ve gone this far, might as well seal your fate, so you sit down next to him, taking a breath and pulling the covers up over the both of you.

Your instincts were right. It’s too close, you can feel him pressed up against you and there’s honestly nowhere to go to get away. He’s on his side, facing you, but you turn away, not wanting to look him in the eye. You stare at the wall instead, focusing on ignoring the gentle press of bodies and the heat he radiates. When you press your feet against him, to warm up your ice-cold toes, he yelps softly, but doesn’t pull away. You’re lying as still as you can, and he’s got a shirt on but you haven’t, and the press of fabric on skin feels too intimate. There may have been a time, in your distant memory, that you would have gladly curled up next to him on a cold night, but that was so long ago, and you were both different people then.

He’s got long arms and they’ve got no place to go but one draped over your own shoulder and one tucked under the pillow you’re sharing. Your feet poke out from the end of the bed, and you curl them up so that they’ll share the heat of the blankets. You’re definitely not curling into him. It’s only because there’s so little room that his legs fit against yours, his knees against the backs of yours.

And it’s certainly only because you’re so tired that you get the best night’s sleep you’ve had in ages.


End file.
